Republican billionaire Meg Whitman, who dropped out of sight in 2010 after a record-setting failed $180 million bid for California governor, emerged Wednesday to criticize the new state budget from Democrats and Gov. Jerry Brown as filled with “gimmicks” and lacking “real reform.”

“The good news is the people of California are going to avoid a big tax increase,” the former eBay CEO told Fox News’ Neal Cavuto Wednesday. But “it is a political budget without a road map to real reform — like we know California really needs.”

Sounding very much like a candidate, Whitman said the California budget plan “relies on unanticipated revenue” — adding that from “where I come from,” that means it “won’t actually materialize.”

She said the state budget plan passed by Democrats “has $3.5 billion in gimmicks,” and “$10 billion in the cruelest type of cuts” to higher education and other services. But that’s because “we didn’t go after pension reform, we didn’t go after the size of government,” she said.

The television appearance by the former eBay CEO, who also jabbed sharply at President Obama Wednesday in the segment on “Your World” hosted by Cavuto, comes Whitman has taken an increasingly high profile role as a leading adviser, supporter and fundraiser for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney; last week, she attended his big ticket fundraiser in Portola Valley. (Cavuto, however, never mentioned her role in the Romney campaign.)

Whitman told Cavuto that Obama’s conference Wednesday gave her “great concern.” Said Whitman: “This president ran on the platform of bringing people together, meeting in the middle… and it has not worked out that way at all. There’s a big hunger for new leadership..he has not been a good leader on the economy.”

As a 2010 gubernatorial candidate in California, Whitman heavily pounded the issue of jobs (her campaign motto was “Jobs are on the Way”) and took what some said were controversial positions. Whtiman insisted her proposals on reducing taxes and regulation would produce 2 million new jobs in California in her first term; she also urged cutting 40,000 from the state payrolls to reduce spending, a call that fired up public employee unions and Democrats.

The spot on Cavuto’s show marked another step in the billionaire Republican’s political re-emergence, a move increasingly evident in the last few weeks.

Whitman’s media outreach efforts began in April with series of private lunches with political reporters around the state — including with reporters from the Chronicle. She’s appeared on radio at the invitation of Sacramento-based radio host Eric Hogue, and recently spoke to a charter school in Redwood City about her unsuccessful run against Brown.

Since her defeat by Brown in November, Whitman has taken on new challenges in the business world. She has joined the landmark Menlo Park venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins, and is now on the board of Proctor & Gamble, Hewlett Packard, and ZipCar, among others.

Whitman has been open recently about her campaign’s failures, including what many say was her reluctance to meet with media — a factor she has acknowledged served to distance her from many voters who only knew her by advertising.

“I think people didn’t get to know me as well as they might have,” Whitman told a Redwood City charter school recently, according to the report from the Sacramento Bee. “I actually think I am very warm, friendly, fun, easy to be around,” she told them. “And I think most people actually, who came to my events, actually were quite persuaded. I think actually people did in fact quite like me when they met me in person.”